A variety of types and forms of outdoor cooking stoves or grills are known in the prior art and commercially available. These generally have a grill body that is adapted to contain a supply of charcoal briquets, supported on a grate with means for supporting a grill over the charcoal briquets, on which the food stuffs to be cooked are placed. In all such devices, it is desired to ignite the charcoal quickly and safely in an outdoor environment. Two techniques are commonly used to ignite the charcoal. Electrically heated starter rods are used powered by a 110 volts source, or a hydrocarbon liquid is poured over the briquets and lit with a match. Clearly, the electrical starter rods can be used only where 110 volt power is available and the ignition process using these rods is very slow. Ignition is faster using the hydrocarbon liquid, however, it is dangerous and the burning liquid produces smoke, objectionable odors and imparts an unpleasant taste to the food being cooked.
Some efforts have been made heretofore to provide ignitors for the charcoal briquets that burn newspapers or other kindling material. These devices usually taken the form of a tubular flue that extends downward from the bottom of a conventional outdoor barbecue grill and a door is provided at the bottom of the flue for removing ashes. This integral structure including the flue, the barbecue grill and the stand for supporting them is two to three feet high, stands on the ground and, while it is portable, it can hardly be placed in a backpack or in the trunk of some small cars; and it would be most inconvenient to set it on a table for use.
the barbecue grill and flue type igniter is cleaned by removing the charcoal and kindling ashes from the bottom of the flue and, usually, any remains of the charcoal that does not fall through the grate to the bottom of the flue must be removed (after cooling) from the grate. Rekindling the charcoal usually cannot be done except after first cleaning out the bottom of the flue and it is not at all convenient to separate unburned charcoal from charcoal ashes and use the charcoal again.